Page:Stevenson - The Wrecker (1892).djvu/447

Rh The boat was now close at hand; a boy in the stern sheets was the only officer, and a poor one plainly, for the men were talking as they pulled.

“Thank God, they've only sent a kind of a middy!” ejaculated Wicks. “Here you, Hardy, stand for'ard! I'll have no deck hands on my quarter-deck,” he cried, and the reproof braced the whole crew like a cold douche.

The boat came alongside with perfect neatness, and the boy officer stepped on board, where he was respectfully greeted by Wicks.

“You the master of this ship?” he asked.

“Yes, sir,” said Wicks. “Trent is my name, and this is the Flying Scud of Hull.”

“You seem to have got into a mess,” said the officer.

“If you'll step aft with me here, I'll tell you all there is of it,” said Wicks.

“Why, man, you're shaking!” cried the officer.

“So would you, perhaps, if you had been in the same berth,” returned Wicks; and he told the whole story of the rotten water, the long calm, the squall, the seamen drowned; glibly and hotly; talking, with his head in the lion's mouth, like one pleading in the dock. I heard the same tale from the same narrator in the saloon in San Francisco; and even then his bearing filled me with suspicion. But the officer was no observer.

“Well, the captain is in no end of a hurry,” said he; “but I was instructed to give you all the assistance in my power, and signal back for another boat if more hands were necessary. What can I do for you?”

“O, we won't keep you no time,” replied Wicks cheerily. “We're all ready, bless you—men's chests, chronometer, papers and all.”

“Do you mean to leave her?” cried the officer.